


Where Have All The Merrymakers Gone?

by The_Lionheart



Series: One Sword [5]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Inter-quel?, Minor Character Death, Minor Injuries, Needles, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-18
Updated: 2016-10-18
Packaged: 2018-08-23 01:33:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8308600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Lionheart/pseuds/The_Lionheart
Summary: Spend every day like the past is a bridge crossing twenty years.Whispers away- not so much,Get your poison tongue out of my ear.Here's a fact you cannot rise above:We'll have problems and then we'll have bigger ones.
   
  -Harvey Danger, "Problems and Bigger Ones"





	1. Woolly Muffler

"Friends will turn against you, people disappoint you every time,

so if you've got greatness in you, would you do us all a favor?

And keep it to yourself."

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It hits Stan as he's fixing a taxidermied gorilla that he can't even remotely pretend was a legal purchase, needle and thread in his teeth as he debates letting the old thing fall apart and using its pieces to create entirely new exhibits.

June 15th, 1997. He's forty-seven years old and he doesn't realize it is his birthday until he is faced with having to reattach the left arm of an ape that died of starvation in a druglord's basement. He's not even sure if he remembers when he got it. Stan takes the needle out of his mouth and stares for a few minutes, gently running the pad of his thumb over the sharpened point. He thinks about the fact that it's been over fifteen years since Stanford- since he- since it happened, and it's been so long since he had even a small victory that he goes days and weeks sometimes now without heading downstairs. A cold panic clutches his heart at the realization- when's the last time he worked on that portal? Was it during the off season? It must have been, because he's just too _busy_ during the busy season, running on four hours of sleep every night between repairs to the house, repairs to the exhibits, building new exhibits, stocking and restocking, taking inventory, and the mountains and mountains of paperwork everything entails, every day, every week, just to keep the bank off his back-

Stan's startled back into the present with a sharp pain in his thumb; he hisses out a soft breath and spends a minute pulling the needle out and rinsing the puncture wound off under the tap. He's... pretty sure he can't catch any weird gorilla diseases, right?

Stan wraps it clumsily with a bandaid and heaves a sigh. No point in working if his mind's not on it. He walks into the kitchen and stops himself short, one hand raised toward the cupboard where he keeps his cans- canned soups, canned stews, canned brown meat in gravy. It's his birthday. He should... he should do something nice for himself. He should. He works hard. He deserves one meal that's been made by someone else.

(He ignores the screaming voice of his subconscious, the voice that doesn't even sound like him, the high-pitched, manic voice that sounds like nobody he's ever met, as it rails against the idea of taking this time off, as it tells him that he doesn't deserve this, he doesn't deserve anything, Stan, _get to work, get back to work_.)

Greasy's is close, and he feels awkward as he steps in, still wearing his Mr. Mystery suit, but Lazy Susan spots him and smiles, tucking a thick strand of brown hair shot through with gray behind her ear.

"Take a seat anywhere, handsome, I'll be right with you." He nods and seats himself in an empty booth behind Dan and Jackie Corduroy, and when Susan comes around it's with a steaming mug of fresh coffee and a ceramic dish full of sugar packets balanced on one hand and a glass tumbler full of cream in the other. "Broke the pitcher for the cream, sorry. Will this do for ya?"

"Yeah, that's fine, that's- that's okay, sugarbear. Sweetcheeks. H-honeycakes. Sugar. I'm- thank you for the sugar," Stan says, flustered. Susan laughs a little, patting his shoulder.

"You want the Blue Plate, Stan? It's chicken-fried steak and mixed veggies this week."

"Sounds fancy. Sure, why not, it's my birthday, live a little," he jokes. She raises a finger and manually 'winks' her lazy eye at him.

"Wink. Okay, birthday boy."

Stan breathes out a sigh of relief once she's gone, putting liberal helpings of cream and sugar into his coffee. God, she's cute, but every time they start flirting he gets all... tongue-tied and stupid, and the few times it's gotten to the point where he's asking her on a date he ends up hyperventilating in his room and calling her house to tell her he can't do it. He figures a classy lady like her would have gotten sick of him by now, but every so often she'll be- she'll be _nice_ , which is pathetic, and he'll start thinking, you know, maybe this time, maybe he'll get his shit together, maybe she won't see what a pathetic disgraceful loser he is.

Stan takes a sip of his coffee with shaking hands. Feels like maybe he's gonna put a stop to it before he can hurt her feelings any more than he has. That's... that's good. Not that he cares. He just... he can think about stuff like, yanno, dating, whatever, being not-alone, after he's done, after he brings Stanford home, after he finally earns back the right to be a real person.

He's just putting his mug down when something heavy and soft flings itself up against the back of his neck, knocking his fez off, and he's extremely careful turning around in the booth seat.

The culprit- doe-eyed, nine-month-old baby girl, her big round head tufted with ginger fluff that gives away who her parents are- squeals and grabs Stan's nose. Stan grins despite himself.

"Wendy, no!" Jackie says, but she's laughing. "Sorry, Mr. Pines, she's just figuring out that she likes to grab everything."

"I can't believe how big this little rugrat's gettin'," Stan says, waiting until Jackie safely pulls the baby's hands away. "Is she standin'? How is she standing?! She's just a little potato with a face!"

Stan makes a series of goofy faces as he speaks, and the baby's laugh is like the tinkling of a jackpot, coins spilling out and bouncing on a velvet carpet.

"This book says babies can pull themselves up and cruise around the house!" Dan says loudly, looking up from a white and pastel book and waving it around. "Next I'm teaching her how to do pullups, like a man!"

"Okay, Danny," Jackie says, rolling her eyes a little. "You want to hold this little potato, Stan? It's been forever since we've seen you."

"Oh, you just want a cheap babysitter, huh?" Stan asks, and she passes Wendy over. Stan bounces her a little, and she laughs again. "Eh? What's so funny, ah? What's so funny, ya little rugrat? Ah? Ah?"

"Raarah," the baby growls, waving her fat little arms at him.

"Raawwr-rawr to you, too," Stan replies seriously.

"Aww, Stan," Susan coos, laying his meal down on the table safely away from the baby. "You're so good with kids."

"He really is," Jackie says, smiling.

"What? Oh no, I'm not. Look at me, I'm a human disaster," Stan argues, and Wendy grabs his nose again. "Aah, help me, Jackie. She's got me."

"Silly man," Jackie laughs, taking Wendy back. "You should come over on Pioneer Day, Stan."

"Ah, no, I'm gonna be busy," he says, grabbing his coffee and taking another sip. "You know how it is. Can't get the boss to give me a day off."

"You're your own boss," Jackie says, unimpressed.

"Yeah, I know, he's a real bastard," Stan agrees, and she laughs again, and the sound makes her daughter laugh, too.

"Well, don't be such a stranger, guy. Did you look at that pamphlet I left on your porch?" she asks.

"I'm gonna say maybe?" Stan tries. "What was it about? Donating to the art gallery again? I'm not- exactly-"

"It's not from the gallery, it's about this artist in England, Damien Hirst. The taxidermy shark guy?" she asks, and he shrugs helplessly, having honestly no idea what she means. Could be he lost the pamphlet, could be the gnomes got to it before he could see it. Jackie sighs, packing up Wendy's diaper bag and leaving money on the table for Susan. "Well, you should take a look sometime, Stan- with the way the art world's going right now, you could really make a name for yourself with some of the stuff you do."

"Jackie, I appreciate the sentiment, but I'm just a simple man of mystery, peddlin' my wares. I ain't no... high-class artistic type," he says bashfully, feeling the same uncomfortable knot in his chest he always gets whenever Jackie Corduroy gets it in her head to try to make a fancy artist out of him.

"Well, it can't hurt to think about it, can it?" she asks, patting his arm. Wendy also reaches over and slams her little arm onto Stan a few times, copying mom. "Come on, Danny, we should get this little rascal home before she pummels Mr. Pines to death."

Stan smiles at the family as they leave, before tucking into his Blue Plate special. It's actually pretty good.

Susan gives Stan a slice of pie after he's done- "On the house, birthday boy!"- and he eats it at the counter, and every time she passes by him Susan gives him a smile.

Stan feels... better, when he gets home. He hangs up his suit and puts on his robe, walking out into the gift shop and looking at the vending machine for a while. It really has been a while since he worked downstairs.

A sharp pang of guilt stabs at his (comfortably full for the first time in days? Weeks?) gut. Stan's had a pretty good birthday, but Ford could be... could be hurting real bad. Could be sick, or dying, or starving.

Some birthday. Some brother Stan turned out to be. If it wasn't for Stan, this- the food, the smiles, the baby, the town- this would be Ford's life. And it's not, because Stan _stole_ it from him. He really... he really needs to go downstairs and get to work bringing Ford home.

Stan goes downstairs, and the obnoxious voice in his head that tells him to get to work on the portal goes quiet for the first time in days.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"A labored expat fantasy: you quit your job

and move away with me. Oh, what bliss it would be

to pretend we never met."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All lyrics in this chapter are from Woolly Muffler, by Harvey Danger.


	2. Private Helicopter

"We're not alone but no one speaks English, so we're free

to look into each other's minds and see what we're thinking,

like we always used to."

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

_It takes five years to accept that he's never going to see her again. On what would have been their tenth anniversary he gets dangerously, violently drunk, and nothing is better._

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Ford comes to with a groan. His mouth tastes like nightmares. His back is aching terribly. Someone nearby is laughing- a gritty, nasal sort of laugh, obnoxious, weirdly familiar.

"Wakey, wakey," the voice says. Ford reaches for his gun, and it's not there. He tries not to panic. "Easy there, slugg-urgh-er. Y-you're... safe?"

"Why is that a question?" Ford asks, opening his eyes and shutting them immediately. Too bright. Ugh. No.

"Well... I mean, you're w-with me, so you know. How safe can you really be."

Ford frowns, opens just one eye. The man looking over at him from the driver's seat looks about his age, a mop of wild silver hair making him look a touch older than he otherwise seems, relatively unlined face peering down at him.

"And you are?" he asks, rubbing one shoulder and glancing fitfully around. He seems to be in the passenger seat of a car, only it's got a clear dome and out past the dome is... a lot of stars. "Are- are we flying through space right now?"

"Wow, you really _are_ a genius," the man says drily, taking a sip from a silver flask. "Don't remember a lot of what happened last night, do you Pines?"

(her eyes wide, frightened, falling, her blonde hair billowing up around her face for just a moment before she's gone)

"No, not really," Ford says, sitting up with a groan. "Who are you?"

"Oh wow. I'm not the first Rick Sanchez you've met, am I?" the man asks, and something clicks into place. Ford points, his jaw dropping.

"Ricardo Sanchez? We were lab partners for three semesters? _That_ Rick Sanchez?"

Rick pauses, tapping his flask against his mouth.

"Ehhh, yes and no, probably. You taste like you've been dimension-hopping, your particles mostly read 46*\\. Do you know where you are right now?"

"Ugh," Ford says, massaging the bridge of his nose. "Last I remember was... Dimension A5-9%. Bar on Graphnar-4."

"Ohhhhohohohohoho," Rick says, laughing evilly. Ford glares over at him. "Well son, you're en route to Earth, at least. This is Dimension C-137. I don't know how you ended up in this dimension or on Planet Maxxo-Malick, but you are a messy drunk, you know that, right?"

"...what do you mean I taste like-" Ford starts, and Rick holds out a dark gunmetal device with something like a human tongue hanging out the front of it. "Great Caesar's Ghost! Don't touch me with that thing!"

"Great Caesar's Ghost," Rick repeats in a mocking tone. "So what are you doing this close to Earth, Pines? Usually I run into one of you waaaaaaay out in the middle of nowhere."

"I'm not trying to get any closer to Earth than I have to, I'm just... trying to keep moving," Ford mutters, a wave of nausea hitting him mid-sentence.

"Don't throw up in here," Rick warns.

"It smells like you've already thrown up in here," Ford protests weakly.

"So? It's my ship, you can get out and walk if you want," Rick snaps, rolling his eyes.

"So... so you know me? Other versions?" Ford asks, squeezing his eyes shut.

"Mm. Met a couple of dimension-hopping six-fingered Pineses. Other Ricks have met more, there's a Twin Pines Hotel at the Citadel."

Ford makes a soft noise, caught between horrified and disgusted and utterly fascinated. "Are they all... have they all gone through the same things I have?"

"Eh." Rick glances over, feigning indifference. "Most of the Sixer Pineses have. Some are your brother, I know that. Sometimes it's your uncle or your aunt."

"I don't have any uncles or aunts," Ford says, _some are your brother_ stinging for some reason.

"Well obviously these are dimensions where you do, dipshit." Rick takes a swig from his flask again. Ford's pretty sure he shouldn't do that while flying.

The star sapphire is inert against his chest. He's come to accept that it will always be so, but-

"Any of the other Sixers married? Traveling with a... a blonde woman, my height, glasses, scars-"

"Hey, whoa, I don't know every one of your life stories," Rick says, putting a hand up. Ford wilts a little, leaning his forehead against the curved dome window. It really was too much to hope for.

"Where are we going now?" he asks wearily.

"Earth, unless you got somewhere better to be."

"I don't know that's such a hot idea, Rick. I'm wanted in a... few dimensions," Ford hedges.

"Yeah, we've all seen the wanted posters, big shot. Most Ricks are in juuuust as much trouble with the Galactic Federation as you are." Rick glances back at him. "Most of the time I stay as far away from Earth as I can."

"What's bringing you home, then?" he asks, and Rick is quiet for a little while.

"I found out- well, one of the me's found out- my daughter had kids. Did you ever, uh, ever meet your Rick's Beth?"

"I haven't seen Rick-46*\ since college, so, probably not," Ford says, frowning. "Is that one girl the mother? Oh, what was her name... Evangeline something?"

"Whoa, wow, no," Rick says, huffing out a small laugh. "Wow, that- no. Hell no. Number one, we broke up like, halfway through senior year-"

"-I have no memory of this at all," Ford interjects. "We weren't exactly friends."

"-second, Evangeline didn't have the parts to get pregnant and I hadn't figured out partial cloning yet, so, uh, no. Guess you never met her mother, either."

They fall silent for a few minutes.

"What day is it in Earth years?" Ford asks. Rick glances at something incomprehensible to Ford, even with his translator.

"August 20th, 1997," Rick says, nonchalantly adding, "Little... Mortimer was born two days ago. Mortimer. That's not a name you stick on a kid, for Chrissakes."

"That's a terrible name for a kid," Ford agrees. "So you're going home to see little... Morty?"

"Pffft. No. Are you- are you kiddin'? I've got- I've got important shit to do. Science. You might not remember what it's like but science i-is, science is-" Rick waves his flask around. "It's important."

"Right." Ford leans back, looking at the stars. "I mean, I'd want to go home to see my grandkids if I had any."

"Well, hey, that's not your problem, now is it?"

Ford scratches his nose. "It's been a while since I've been on an Earth. If you felt that it was safe, I wouldn't mind being dropped off at the most convenient portal station."

"Earth still doesn't have portal technology," Rick says, before adding, "legally. Technically."

"Do you have access to a portal generator? I would really appreciate getting out of here as soon as possible-" Ford starts, and Rick sighs loudly.

"Fiiiine. I'll go to Earth and see the stupid kids for like, a minute."

"Okay, that's not really what I was-" Ford says, bemused.

"And then- I dunno, I have a prototype portal gun, it might turn your guts inside out," Rick warns.

"That... sounds like a plan," Ford says. "I was traveling by portal sword for a while there."

"That sounds like the stu-upidest thing I've ever heard of," Rick says decisively, reaching down to turn on the radio. It's mostly static, but Ford lets him use it to prevent further conversation before the little blue planet comes into view.

(Ford knows what it must look like- a family home, green lawn scattered with plastic toys, two vomit-stained and dirty middle-aged men with guns climbing in through the window in the dead of night. He just needs this version of his old schoolmate to provide him with portal tech, that's all.)

(There's a chubby infant, just a few days old, and Rick holds him like he's something precious, tells him seriously that he's only going to be calling him Morty because he never signed off on this Mortimer bullshit, and he leans in close and breathes in the smell of the baby's sparse fuzz, his nose and mouth against the crown of the infant's head. Rick closes his eyes and Ford looks away, sure that he wasn't meant to see this.)

They go to Las Vegas afterward, because Rick may be a lot of things but he apparently has connections everywhere. Ford barely has time to get over feeling hungover before he and Rick start getting utterly wasted.

"S-so you're married?" Rick asks after their... after a drink that neither of them should've had. "Been married. Not a f-f-fan."

"I was," Ford says, knocking back something that tastes like furniture polish. Not that he knows what... no, he does know what furniture polish tastes like, he made mistakes one weekend while trying to make his cabin more homey. "She... didn't make it."

"S'fuckin' rough," Rick says agreeably, swaying in his seat. "Some of the yous fuck Ricks."

"I'm nah innerested in fucking... anybody," Ford says, blinking. "You... dated a Sixer?"

"Me?" Rick asks, too wrecked to pull off the innocent look. "Nah. Fucked a couple Fivers, though."

"Bleaahh, I don't want to hear you talking about... that... asshole," Ford groans, picking up a glass that... might or might not belong to him. It tastes recognizably like tequila, though, so that's a bonus.

"You like the Patron, huh?" Rick asks, waggling his singular brow at Ford.

"Is that tequila?" Ford asks, and Rick nods. "Yeah, I guess."

"Check this out," Rick says, pouring directly from his flask into Ford's empty glass. After that, Ford... definitely remembers taking at least one sip.

The next thing he remembers is waking up fully dressed in a bathtub, under a violently purple sky. He glances blearily around, at orange grass and trees that look far too like grasping fingers. There is a strange device in his lap, and a note in his own handwriting that reads, _dear Sober Ford, the instructions are in your Journal. Only got three shots left. Pretty sure if you're reading this guts did not turn inside out. Love, Drink Ford._

Ford blinks slowly at the paper in his hand, and glances down at the postscript.

_PS: Ricks alright._

"I'm too old to be doing this," Ford mutters, climbing unsteadily out of the bathtub with a groan. He's not going to question how or why Rick put an empty claw-foot tub out here.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"I reserve the right to hold my grudges. Friends like you,

you know the rest. But all told, I hold on to my anger

far too long, until it's a joke."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All lyrics in this chapter from Private Helicopter, by Harvey Danger.


	3. Old Hat

"Call me the looming shapes of winter dusk impending.

She barely fits inside my head,

but I feel something."

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

_She remembers another human with her- a man in black gear like a soldier or a SWAT officer- who came over once she was shoved into the room, shivering in the thin shirt and gym shorts she'd been wearing to go to sleep in. She remembers that he took the shirt off his back- black, almost the right size, with his name SAVAGE stitched onto the breast pocket- and helped stuff her trembling arms into the sleeves. She remembers that he was kind, that he spoke gently, that his name was John, and that he tried to teach her how to fight, how to resist being taken the next time their abductors came. She doesn't remember what happened when they came for her, but she must have failed, because there's a gap in her memory between the last time she saw him and being traded to another alien, dull purple with too many arms and a mouth full of wolf's teeth._

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

She still has gaps, but she knows it has been four months-eleven days-three hours since she was bought and sold to the merchant who deals mostly in complicated-looking crystal objects that do weird things. She understands- vaguely- that she is here as much for helping with heavy lifting as she is here as a status symbol, which makes no sense to her. But the merchant- skin the color of curdled milk, bulbous pink-green gelatinous baubles instead of eyes, a mouth that opens up onto a mass of tentacles- is nice enough, for an entity that treats her, at best, like a moderately expensive pet. They don't really touch her much, outside of occasionally arranging her hair into ribboned styles that make her think of those little fluffy dogs that look like mops, pink bows tying the longer fur up into ponytails to show their button-black eyes. Once in a while she allows herself the fantasy of being back home, on Earth- any Earth, really- and having one of those little dogs.

It's not so bad. They make her wear a collar, and she teaches herself to read the local language enough to read the tags (backwards, in a mirror,) and she's not sure how she feels about the name "Candlehead" or "if found, return to Unit 443.39."

"Candlehead," she says to herself in English, before repeating it in the merchant's language, "Arrankh'itah." ("Candle Head," her translator helpfully supplies.)

She touches the scar lining the side of her face. "Ripley." (The translator is silent.)

Today the merchant comes into her pen, eyes pulsing little flashes of baby-blue that mean they're happy and excited but also anxious, and they lead in two humans (!!!) on leashes and locks them in the pen with her.

"You can't keep us in here, you fuck!" one of the humans yells, before spotting her. "Hey! Who are you? Are you human?"

Ripley will answer- definitely, don't want to miss out on talking to another human- but she has forty-seven more pushups to do before she's done. She tunes out the other two humans in the room so she can finish her routine- or, well, she tries to, because with twelve left to go, one of the humans comes over and grabs her arm, snapping his fingers in her face.

"Hey, are you deaf or something?" he shouts, and she frowns and looks him over.

"I'm human," she tells him, glancing at the other human. "I'm not deaf. I can't count while talking."

"Are you fucking kidding me-" the shouty human starts, and the other human puts out a hand.

"It's fine. I'm Elliot. May we start talking to you?" he asks. She hesitates, then nods her head.

"Okay, fine." She sits, drinking in the sight of them. "Which Earth are you from?"

"Which..." Elliot looks confused for a moment. "How many Earths are there?"

"Well, less than the number of dimensions, I guess, but there's infinity dimensions so there's probably infinity Earths," Ripley says with a shrug. Shouty Human snorts. "You don't know your original dimension's designation?"

"No, I'm afraid not," Elliot says, and Ripley feels a rush of sympathy for them, knowing they'll probably never even know if they're home or not. "What's yours?"

"Forty-six little-floating-star leaning-line," Ripley says, and he frowns.

"This is ridiculous," Shouty Human mutters angrily. Ripley cocks her head to one side. "We need to find a way to get back to the Foundation, not chat up the local tail-"

"Grayson," Elliot says gently. "We're stuck for now. We might as well gather what information we can."

"Oh, yeah, like she's gonna know anything? She can't be older than twenty," Shouty Grayson says.

"No, I'm twenty-two probably," Ripley objects.

"Probably?" Elliot asks.

"Well, I don't remember when my birthday is, but I know I was nineteen when I first got abducted, and that was three years ago, so." She shrugs.

"Well, it's pretty late in the year, so your birthday probably has passed already," Elliot says, smiling faintly. "Why don't you remember when your birthday is?"

"Eh, whoever snatched me up and put me in Dimension 98@ had some kinda lobotomizer," she explains, pushing her hair back to show the still-fading scar. "I don't think they had the settings right, though, because I'm almost positive I was supposed to come out of that all docile and good. Small favors, though, right?"

"I-I suppose," Elliot says, looking startled. He really must be new, Ripley reflects. "What's your name, miss?"

"Ripley Savage," she says proudly. It's only the fourth time she's had a chance to say her name to someone other than herself in a mirror. "And you two are Elliot and Grayson? You got last names, too?"

"Those are our last names," Grayson mutters from the corner of the pen. "Great. So what is this place?"

"We're in Dimension ^G72," Ripley says, and the two new humans exchange troubled glances. "How long ago did you two get taken?"

"We didn't get taken, technically," Elliot explains, sitting down next to her. "We... were part of an exploratory mission, through a... hole our scientific foundation discovered. Agent Grayson and I were separated from our group, and we stumbled upon... something, and we were caught out. By my estimate that was on December 10th, 1997... that was, what, a week ago?"

"About a week," Grayson mutters. Ripley nods.

"Hey, Merry Christmas. Or Happy Hanukkah." She tilts her head, pointing at the patch on Elliot's shoulder, two concentric circles with three arrows pointing outward. "John had a thing like that. Does that mean you're cops, too?"

"What? This is- this is the Foundation," Elliot says, but it's Grayson who grabs her by the arm.

"You ran into Foundation Personnel? What was the guy's name?" he asks quickly. Ripley gently removes his hand.

"John Savage. He was with me in 98@ for a few weeks before we got separated, but I don't think he was from the same dimension as me."

Elliot makes a confused face at her. "But you said your name is also Savage?"

Grayson shoves Elliot's shoulder a little. "Don't bother her about that, Doc. Look, kid-"

"Ripley," Ripley says firmly, still smiling.

"-you said you were in the same place as this guy for a few weeks, what did he look like?"

"This tall," Ripley says, holding a hand up to the top of her head. "Short black hair with gray right here," she puts her fingers to her temples. "Brown skin, brown eyes. He had a black shirt like that one," she points at Grayson's shirt, "but he gave me it because I wa'n't dressed proper for the cold when they got me."

"So, what, an MTF agent?" Grayson asks in a low whisper, and Elliot shrugs. "What happened to this guy?"

"I don't know," Ripley says, her smile slipping. "He was trying to teach me stuff so we could break out, but I... I don't know. I woke up and I was somewhere else."

"Well, listen, I-" Elliot starts, but the merchant comes in and Ripley sits up, having learned from past experience that they really don't like being ignored.

"[Do you like your little friends, Candlehead?]" they ask, hooking a leash on her collar.

"Hey, where are you taking her?" Grayson asks sharply. The merchant ignores him.

"[They seem nice. You got more humans?]" Ripley asks hopefully, and the merchant laughs. She can see Grayson and Elliot tense up from across the room- when they laugh, all the tentacles come out, so she understands why they're weirded out. Especially if it's their first time meeting anybody who's not human.

"[Oh, no, we're just watching them while M'Lagge is out shopping. Although I suppose we'll see more of them if M'Lagge decides to breed a couple of litters with you. That'll be fun, won't it?]"

Ripley trips over her own feet, looking nervously at Grayson and Elliot. "[I- I don't want to do that.]"

"[Well, I'm probably going to need to sell some puppies to make up for the cost of keeping you, so I don't want to hear any complaints,]" they say sternly, pulling sharply on the leash to make her follow. "[You don't want to be sold to someone who'll just use you for pitfighting, do you?]"

"Hey! Let her go, you alien piece of shit!" Grayson snarls, and Elliot has to physically stop him from lunging at the merchant. Disapproval colors their bulbs to a low, pulsing olive-green color, and they pull Ripley closer.

"[M'Lagge needs to train their animals better.]" Ripley is silent on the way to the groomer, and is silent when they get back and the humans- the first humans she's seen in three years, since John, humans who maybe even knew John- are gone. She is silent when the merchant makes a small comment about maybe one of their other friends has a human who can make some cute humans with her. She is silent when she realizes she's probably never going to see those two humans again. She is silent when, as a reward for her good behavior today, the merchant lets her sleep on the foot of their bed, even though it's been a struggle to cage-train her.

She's silent as she gets up and stands next to the head of the bed, staring down at the merchant, a nice, solid, heavy bedside lamp in her hands. When they startle awake they cry out, "[What are you doing, Candlehead?]"

And she breaks her silence- "It's Ripley, I'm Ripley, my name is Ripley, I'm Ripley"- and there's a struggle, because she's a good foot and a half shorter than they are, but they don't want to damage something they spent so much money on, and by the time it's over Ripley's mouth and hands are covered in their silver-blue blood. She's never killed anybody before. She feels sad, and angry that she's sad, and then she feels nothing, and curls up in the pen where she last saw the other humans and waits.

Eventually someone notices that the merchant hasn't left their house. Eventually someone discovers the body. Ripley is silent when she is impounded, and she's silent when she's sold in the estate sale to someone who lives in a different dimension. She tells herself that the humans are probably dead or back to their own place by now.

She meets other humans every couple of years or so, but it's seven years before she gets to know one long enough to learn their name, and when it happens his name is Ford and he doesn't trust her.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"I forget what my friends look like,

and they forget why they like me, but that's old hat.

I'm so happy, how do you write about that?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyrics in this chapter are from "Old Hat," by Harvey Danger.


End file.
